Running over downed trees into a giant weenie

I had to do a few hurdles the first mile of my five-mile run the day after Irene. The streets and sidewalks were filled with downed tree limps and the sounds of running generators.

It didn’t dawn on me that my route might be a mistake until I got to the house where a giant doberman usually charged across his lawn at me before being stopped by an electric fence. I wondered “did those fences still work when the power was out?” before I considered I should have gone another way. Luckily the scary pooch wasn’t out and I wouldn’t be returning this way… or so I thought.

When I rounded the next corner, I found a National Grid man standing near some cones.

“You’ll have to turn around, that line on the ground is live.”

“I’m pretty sure I can jump over it,” I said.

He just looked at me. I turned around and headed for home.

When I had gone a few feet, an SUV pulled up to the National Grid man. The driver rolled down his window and yelled, “You could have put up a sign further up the road!” as if the guys for National Grid had been relaxing and eating bon-bons all weekend instead restoring power for thousands of people.

The guy wasn’t done. Like a true weenie, he pulled his car around so he could drive away at any minute and continued. “You guys are *&^%^^ing schmucks. All you had to do was put a *&^&*ing sign up. *&^*&^%&*^ *&^%&^*^ *&^%&*^&% schmucks *&^% sign *&^% schmucks.”

You get the picture.

He continued for twice as long as it would have taken him to drive another route while I stood there, watched and considering dragging him out of his car and giving him a purple nurple. To his credit, the National Grid kept his cool. I would have been tempted to say, “Go ahead, drive over the line!”

After a while, the giant weenie ran out of steam (who can really yell at someone for that long) and drove off angrily. I’d hate to be running down whatever roads that guy was driving down. Oh wait, I already was.